Exploring public concerns about geoengineering the climate

UK researchers talk about pumping reflective aerosols into the atmosphere.

Manage the symptoms or go after the root cause? In a way, those are the choices available to deal with climate change. If the task of weaning ourselves off fossil fuels (and reining in deforestation) is too unappealing, a potentially more palatable alternative is geoengineering—intentionally manipulating the climate system. With the large-scale removal of CO2 from the atmosphere currently beyond our grasp, shading the planet with reflective aerosols might be the most effective tool in our kit.

That’s no free lunch, of course. Some aerosols have direct, negative effects on human health, and a hiccup in the system would induce drastic climatic changes. Aerosols cover up the warming effect of greenhouse gases, but they don’t stay in the atmosphere very long. Stop replenishing the aerosols and the planet could very quickly feel the full force of that “hidden” warming. The vulnerability of such a system to international disagreements, war, and even terrorist attacks is obvious.

If all this makes you a little nervous about the idea, you’re not alone. Geoengineering research has been controversial. A perspective in Nature Climate Change describes an effort to engage the public to understand common concerns ahead of one such research project in the UK—the Stratospheric Particle Injection for Climate Engineering (SPICE) project.

The SPICE design would involve a pipe running 20 kilometers up to helium blimps that would hold the release nozzles for injecting aerosols into the stratosphere. The project team planned to build a prototype that would extend just one kilometer up into the atmosphere (and pump only water) to work on the engineering challenges of making such a system work in the future.

Before that test got off the ground, the team was asked to get a better handle on how the public would feel about it. To accomplish this, the team organized two-day “workshops” with a sampling of people in three British cities, talking with 32 people in total. At each workshop, guided (but open-ended) discussions allowed researchers to really probe the participants’ views. This wasn’t about accurately polling the UK; it was about gaining a deeper understanding of different perspectives.

On the first day, discussions focused on the general concept of aerosol geoengineering. Although the participants felt that scientists should be researching such technologies (keeping our options open), there was a lot of discomfort that geoengineering would only put off the need to reduce greenhouse gases.

Interestingly, some of the hesitation to engage in geoengineering came from its perceived unnaturalness. The paper notes, “Stratospheric aerosols in particular were also depicted by some as contributing to a disassociation of humankind from the physical world, with uncertainties and global risks deemed likelier as a result.” The planet has a track record we’re generally familiar with, whereas unprecedented efforts like this (though our fossil fuel emissions are an experiment of their own) may inspire fear of the unknown. We’re all raised on cautionary tales of hubris, so perhaps some even see shades of Icarus’ wings in these aerosol-spraying blimps.

Another major theme was the need for international agreement and governance of any geoengineering project. For example, say the modification of the climate system carried out by one nation has negative impacts in another. Would the country running the system be held responsible?

Most doubted international agreement would be easy to achieve. As one person put it, “It’s a concern because when they’ve had these climate change seminars [for example, Kyoto] and groups, nobody ever agrees, and what guarantee would we have that everybody would actually agree over something like this?”

On the second day of the workshops, talk zeroed in on the SPICE test itself. The researchers noticed a real shift here—participants were much more supportive of the prototype trial than they were of actual large-scale geoengineering efforts. As long as the test would be safe for people in the vicinity and wasn’t likely to cause environmental harm, they were OK with it going forward.

Mostly, the participants wanted to understand why the researchers designed the test the way they did. What did they expect to learn? Would it really be applicable to a full-size version of the system? And, of course, why spend money on this instead of something else?

As it turns out, the SPICE field test was submarined by patent issues, though the rest of the research project continues. Still, public engagement like this helps plot out smoother sailing for this project and others like it. Geoengineering has the potential to be a publicly sticky issue, so it’s wise to understand the reasons for queasiness early on.

One thing the participants wanted was transparency and clear communication throughout the project. Knowing this could ensure that funding and coordination to make that happen is prioritized. The more viewpoints you collect now, the more productive the national conversation can be later. If the big concerns are addressed, you might have a better chance at getting people on the same page to work toward informed decisions.

To avoid a repeat of the public controversies that have exploded over climate science and genetically modified organisms, it will help to understand public reactions before they’re splashed across the opinion pages of major newspapers.

You link to an official propaganda page for a Republican House member? LOL, problem is he is full of sht.

Wait a minute there. Are you denying that a five-year drilling bank was imposed? If the fact is accurate, what does the quote source matter?

Wait a minute there. *cough* Why did you leave out the link? (EDIT: Oh, and my line of text after that, BTW) That goes towards him being full of sht. I just find it hilarious that you would expect something different from such a source (something that wasn't, as I originally asserted, "nonsense talking points").

Further, you actually think that any meaningful amount of oil & gas were going to get produced off the coast of Virginia anytime soon? You really have no clue about the time scales involved. Which is only a small piece of your ignorance of the industry....

The second half of your post falls into the same category, too. It isn't about "saving it for future generations", it is about maximizing reserve value by limiting sloppy, wasteful use of a resource. EDIT: It is actually that twice, incidentally. Because the resource of water is a huge factor in shale oil, build-up of tech for lower water use well development is important.

Ecofascists would much to prefer tax the people to the pre-stone age era. All fire is forbidden.

What about choosing the most cost-effective solution, if global warming really is a problem? I would prefer for my climate to be warmer, that is not to expend a significant amount of money for heating living spaces 8 months a year.

You can't be serious... "Global Warming" does not mean it just gets a bit warmer everywhere. It means severe disruptions in local climate and weather patterns, affecting rainfall and droughts, changing patterns of energy transport via water and air streams...

There are indications that both the ongoing droughts in the US and the cold long winters in Europe are part of what "Global Warming" comes with.

You know what, lets say the technology is perfect and we can absolutely control the effects (hahaha).

Even then, geo-engineering is a dumb-fucking idea. Which government is gonna decide that hey, let us change the climate? And if the UK wants to do that so London is not submerged, you don't think Iran or North Korea or Russia might just take the UK pumping billions of tonnes of chemicals into the atmosphere as an excuse for war?

And the deniers don't even want people setting up windmills as a response to global warming. You don't think they will be able to significantly affect any decision to dump chemicals into the air we all breathe (I can already see the memes with Obama next to Hitler captioned "Obama wants to turn the entire planet into a gas chamber").

Even if we solve the technological and scientific issues with geoengineering, in a world where reducing fossil fuel usage by a few percent is politically impossible, geoengineering proponents want us to ignore the political impossibility geoengineering is.

Since the underlying problem is the cost of clean energy, why isn't our focus on intensifying research to lower that cost? By far the most promising technological pathway involves the use of molten salts within a nuclear reactor which combines a high heat capacity with high temperatures (useful process heat) and low pressures. We should be trying to maximize the economic potential of our nuclear systems by improving efficiency and dramatically lowering liability. We should be looking at super breeding possibilities to minimize our need for mining fissile and storing the depleted uranium (future fuel).

This, although this is being worked on. There are blueprints for a sizable test reactor in the process of being approved. It is to use a cyclotron accelerator to bombard (IIRC) a proton stream into a sub-critical pile of spent (AKA waste) material from a traditional fission reactor. This does require energy input to run but returns roughly a factor of 5 more energy in return.

Benefits- no run-away of fission reactions because the pile is sub-critical, if you want to turn down the heat you turn off the cyclotron which is a passive action rather than having to use carbon rods to actively thwart fission chain reactions- no "meltdowns", operating temp is already as hot as it is going to get- destruction of all this troublesome nuke waste we have, it gets fissioned down into far safer elements!

After approval it will need funding, and a number of years, to build. So yeah, when that hits the news push for it.

Why is it expected that we'll dramatically lower reactor cost by adding a new and expensive particle accelerator to the mix? I'm not saying that there can not be any use to this approach, but it seems to ignore the importance of focusing on the economics.

This represents a fundamental change in reactors process.

A huge chunk of current reactor costs are safety related, in operation and waste disposal. A design that uses an inherently safer process leads to cheaper, ultimately. A design that disposes of a highly toxic material we have laying around flips on its head the biggest problem with nuclear reactors have had till this point.

This is very much about improving economics.

I agree generally, but my specific objection relates to the use of an accelerator in the system. This is completely unnecessary.

Define "necessary". It is [practically speaking] for the benefits I gave, particularly the ability to operate with a subcritical (and therefore fail-safe) pile.

EDIT: Capital outlay is expensive at this point but we are at the research point on the tech curve right now. The safety aspect is critical, especially for political acceptance. Fail-safe, meaning it won't run-away if you stop actively interacting with it, is huge in that respect.

Also note that it does NOT breed Pu in meaningful amounts, which makes it much more politically acceptable internationally due to not being suited for weapons development.

Wait a minute there. Are you denying that a five-year drilling bank was imposed? If the fact is accurate, what does the quote source matter?

Wait a minute there. *cough* Why did you leave out the link? (EDIT: Oh, and my line of text after that, BTW) That goes towards him being full of sht. I just find it hilarious that you would expect something different from such a source (something that wasn't, as I originally asserted, "nonsense talking points").

Tyler, you are being disingenuous. Your Thursday, April 1, 2010 Washington Post reference is obsolete given the actual 5-year no-development order I cited, and which is dated November 8, 2011, one-and-a-half years later.

Your call for postponement of use of a resource of which the U.S. is amply endowed because of "sloppiness" also rings hollow. Per this rationale, Edison was wrong to invent and market the incandescent light bulb, because these waste most of their energy as heat. Six generations of people should have lighted by candlelight, dammit, waiting for 2010-2012 when efficient LED lighting became available!

Wait a minute there. Are you denying that a five-year drilling bank was imposed? If the fact is accurate, what does the quote source matter?

Wait a minute there. *cough* Why did you leave out the link? (EDIT: Oh, and my line of text after that, BTW) That goes towards him being full of sht. I just find it hilarious that you would expect something different from such a source (something that wasn't, as I originally asserted, "nonsense talking points").

Tyler, you are being disingenuous.

No, I am not. You are...or are just are a really poor reader and managed to first miss the link and then miss the sentence below my link. Bringing us to:

Quote:

Your Thursday, April 1, 2010 Washington Post reference is obsolete given the actual 5-year no-development order I cited, and which is dated November 8, 2011, one-and-a-half years later.

How am I disingenuous when I pointed out the temporal relationship myself? That you failed to quote my sentence doesn't mean it does not exist. Also, it is not obsolete in regards to Hastings claimed "Since President Obama took office, he has systematically taken steps to re-impose an offshore drilling moratorium...".

Now onto the next part you missed/disingenuously ignored: The nature of offshore development is such that lease procurement till production timelines run around a decade. This does not shorten when dealing with an entirely new region.

So in truth the your original bringing in of that moratorium is irrelevant to the discussion of current private/public mix.

Quote:

Your call for postponement of use of a resource of which the U.S. is amply endowed because of "sloppiness" also rings hollow.

To you. I assume because you don't actually have a clue, or maybe because you want to believe so. *shrug* Smart money is on a little of both. EDIT: Who am I kidding, smart money is on a LOT of both.

Quote:

Per this rationale, Edison was wrong to invent and market the incandescent light bulb, because these waste most of their energy as heat. Six generations of people should have lighted by candlelight, dammit, waiting for 2010-2012 when efficient LED lighting became available!

Well, as a Research Hydraulic Engineer (retired) for the USACE ERDC CHL wherein I was primarily responsible for dimensional analysis of structures in fluid environments, where is the engineering analysis (at 1:20 scale and 1:1 prototype scales) showing that the following four similitude criteria have been met?

1) Geometric2) Kinematic3) Dynamic4) Failure

As one of the patent holders on the LMCS which built a 1:10 scale model meeting ALL of the above four criteria (wherein the last criteria (4) is the most difficult to achieve at scale properly (i. e. not just measuring stresses in situ but designing the 1:20 SPICE model with realistic failure modes at scale)), where is the engineering study/report and/or peer reviewed paper and/or OMFG anything showing something related to the engineering aspects of a 1 km (and 20 km) high pressure/tension structure?

You know, something like specific modulus or specific strength to begin with anyways.

A 20 km self supporting (from the top) pressure/tension structure, is IMHO, so pie-in-the-sky at this point in time (and yes, that includes all the existing high modulus/strength unidirectional plastics (e. g. Kevlar)), that it is of no surprise that, instead of showing an actual engineering study, these 'scientists' would rather chase after patents on something that they could not possibly build at 1:1 prototype scale at this point in time. After all, nothing in a patent has to show the actual engineering practicality (today or any future date for that matter) of such a device to begin with in the first place.

And if anyone says carbon nanotubes, my reply to them is, show me the horizontal test bed where the pressure, tension, shear, hoop/longitudinal/diagonal stresses and wrinkling moments have been done with a 1:20 carbon nanotube model using real world hypothetical loadings, TYVM.

Since the underlying problem is the cost of clean energy, why isn't our focus on intensifying research to lower that cost? By far the most promising technological pathway involves the use of molten salts within a nuclear reactor which combines a high heat capacity with high temperatures (useful process heat) and low pressures. We should be trying to maximize the economic potential of our nuclear systems by improving efficiency and dramatically lowering liability. We should be looking at super breeding possibilities to minimize our need for mining fissile and storing the depleted uranium (future fuel).

This, although this is being worked on. There are blueprints for a sizable test reactor in the process of being approved. It is to use a cyclotron accelerator to bombard (IIRC) a proton stream into a sub-critical pile of spent (AKA waste) material from a traditional fission reactor. This does require energy input to run but returns roughly a factor of 5 more energy in return.

Benefits- no run-away of fission reactions because the pile is sub-critical, if you want to turn down the heat you turn off the cyclotron which is a passive action rather than having to use carbon rods to actively thwart fission chain reactions- no "meltdowns", operating temp is already as hot as it is going to get- destruction of all this troublesome nuke waste we have, it gets fissioned down into far safer elements!

After approval it will need funding, and a number of years, to build. So yeah, when that hits the news push for it.

Are you speaking of Terrapower? Are there other major proposals besides ones with celebrity endorsements that are using spent fuel as the primary source? Most of the other Gen IV + stuff I see seems to revolve around new fissile material and/or thorium. Enlighten me!

Since the underlying problem is the cost of clean energy, why isn't our focus on intensifying research to lower that cost? By far the most promising technological pathway involves the use of molten salts within a nuclear reactor which combines a high heat capacity with high temperatures (useful process heat) and low pressures. We should be trying to maximize the economic potential of our nuclear systems by improving efficiency and dramatically lowering liability. We should be looking at super breeding possibilities to minimize our need for mining fissile and storing the depleted uranium (future fuel).

This, although this is being worked on. There are blueprints for a sizable test reactor in the process of being approved. It is to use a cyclotron accelerator to bombard (IIRC) a proton stream into a sub-critical pile of spent (AKA waste) material from a traditional fission reactor. This does require energy input to run but returns roughly a factor of 5 more energy in return.

Benefits- no run-away of fission reactions because the pile is sub-critical, if you want to turn down the heat you turn off the cyclotron which is a passive action rather than having to use carbon rods to actively thwart fission chain reactions- no "meltdowns", operating temp is already as hot as it is going to get- destruction of all this troublesome nuke waste we have, it gets fissioned down into far safer elements!

After approval it will need funding, and a number of years, to build. So yeah, when that hits the news push for it.

Are you speaking of Terrapower? Are there other major proposals besides ones with celebrity endorsements that are using spent fuel as the primary source? Most of the other Gen IV + stuff I see seems to revolve around new fissile material and/or thorium. Enlighten me!

No, the accelerator driven reactor (ADS) is the Energy Amplifier, while Terrapower is a looking into a travelling wave reactor (TWR) which is a type of fast neutron machine. The MSR is just one type of reactor that can be used in a variety of spectrums, but I think it is important to focus on the thermal spectrum so that the fissile requirements can be low. I think efficient energy production and expansion capability (low fissile loads) should be emphasized over waste annihilation (a political goal).

Our task is to build a nuclear economy at a capacity of 50 TW by 2050. Today the world consumes about 17 TW of energy in a variety of forms (a large portion of which goes to liquid fuel production), and nuclear provides less than 400 GWe as electricity. High quality process heat and scalability is vital to move nuclear production into efficient energy-carrier synthesis.

The immaturity of the field means that there is still a little science to do (the basic systems have been understood for decades), and we are short of personnel who are familiar with both the chemistry and physics of MSRs- which is one of the inconvenient truths about our situation. We must take a strong interest in our survival and figure how to make these systems work, but we now know enough to direct our resources towards endeavors that will bring about rapid progress.

The immaturity of the field means that there is still a little science to do (the basic systems have been understood for decades), and we are short of personnel who are familiar with both the chemistry and physics of MSRs- which is one of the inconvenient truths about our situation. We must take a strong interest in our survival and figure how to make these systems work, but we now know enough to direct our resources towards endeavors that will bring about rapid progress.

Agree with all that. Top those technical gaps (AKA uncertainty) off with politics and the whims of the public driven by chance events and it remains to see where it all comes out, what kind of mix of reactor styles will be out there and the percentages that other sources will continue to hold is still a very open question. I happen to like ADS for the benefits but it is true that the economic determination is still in the technical details to be worked out as part of actually getting a proper prototype up and running.

It is best put that I have a slightly optimistic lean, that our engineering will overcome and we will work out a largely happy ending. It has happened before when we have put our will to things, this is all important enough that I have confidence we will do it again.

P.S. My son, still a few years left yet before college, is likely to help fill that skill gap if space doesn't win out. Uncannily sharp kid and loves physics, especially nuclear physics, fiercely. Has since a very young age.

The immaturity of the field means that there is still a little science to do (the basic systems have been understood for decades), and we are short of personnel who are familiar with both the chemistry and physics of MSRs- which is one of the inconvenient truths about our situation. We must take a strong interest in our survival and figure how to make these systems work, but we now know enough to direct our resources towards endeavors that will bring about rapid progress.

Agree with all that. Top those technical gaps (AKA uncertainty) off with politics and the whims of the public driven by chance events and it remains to see where it all comes out, what kind of mix of reactor styles will be out there and the percentages that other sources will continue to hold is still a very open question. I happen to like ADS for the benefits but it is true that the economic determination is still in the technical details to be worked out as part of actually getting a proper prototype up and running.

It is best put that I have a slightly optimistic lean, that our engineering will overcome and we will work out a largely happy ending. It has happened before when we have put our will to things, this is all important enough that I have confidence we will do it again.

P.S. My son, still a few years left yet before college, is likely to help fill that skill gap if space doesn't win out. Uncannily sharp kid and loves physics, especially nuclear physics, fiercely. Has since a very young age.

I think the ADS makes for a cool science experiment, but I do not see it as a serious attempt to solve the energy crisis with a reliable, inherently safe, low cost reactor. Will this system provide a superior breeding system? We certainly need better ways to produce fissile. The most productive method that I am aware of uses peaceful nuclear explosives (fusion, D-T or D-D) and molten salts in a system called PACER. Any system that improves on this performance would be of interest.

Why would it cause the GDP to grow slower? If they actually do what they're being encouraged to, namely reduce emissions and work on cleaner tech (which may mean more jobs for researchers and inventors), would this not have a positive impact?

Please answer this:

Quote:

Can you show me of any other example, when governments taxed existing product, just to fund research for a better one?

Did government tax black&white TV sets, in order to fund development of color TV sets?Did government tax analogue TV sets, in order to fund development of digital TV sets?Did government tax corded phones, in order to fund development of mobile phones?Did government tax 45nm chips, in order to fund development of 32nm chips?

Why the sense of urgency that current tech is not up to standard? Why expend mounds of resources to expedite the normal progression of technology?

So you're saying that in competitive, evolving markets with a strong incentive to be first on the block with a new must-have product, are willing to invest in those improvements so that their competitors don't beat them out? Well no shit, that never would have occurred to me. Of course it's in no way applicable to THIS situation, since we're not talking about competitive or evolving markets, we're talking about regional monopolies with strong interest in the status quo, further influenced by mountains of money from the oil industries (maybe coal too, I haven't really followed their side of it, since everyone already accepts that coal should be avoided when possible).

As to examples of taxing something to provide disincentive and using that money to fund something else to mitigate that issue, take a look at alcohol and cigarettes. They're both taxed heavily (especially cigarettes), and the money is used to fund education and advertising against underage use, against smoking in general, against drinking and driving, etc.

It's also worth noting that yes, the phone system was and IS taxed, and that money is used to subsidize build-out to areas they wouldn't have otherwise. That is to say, they taxed the thing the incumbents wanted to do anyway (provide phone service to densely populated -- read: most profitable -- areas) and used the proceeds to pay for what they didn't want to do (extend service to sparsely populated areas).

As I pointed out before, it's a very well-established concept in economic theory, and it does work.

That said, the damage done by letting things keep going as they are far outweigh that of marginally reducing the growth of the GDP

That said, the damage done by reducing the growth of the GDP far outweigh that of letting things keep going as they are.

Quite simply, no, it doesn't. Even if we saw a DECLINE in the GDP the damage would be less than letting things continue as they are now. Reduction in growth is just that, not a reduction to the total. Even so, these are temporary issues, that even in the case of an outright depression (I seem to recall a Great one...) can be surmounted. The issue of our impact on global climate is NOT such a temporary thing. Even if we immediately stop all of our carbon emissions, the damage is already done and we don't know what the full impact will be in the long term, only that it will not be good (look already to the increased frequency and severity of storms, amongst countless other issues). If we continue on this path it will only become worse, and eventually you hit a point where there IS no turning back.

You're trying to weigh transient issues that affect some people against long-term issues that threaten nearly all life on this planet. Alas, I can't seem to find any specific estimates for the CO2 concentrations likely to trigger a run-away greenhouse effect on earth, that sufficient quantities WOULD cause it is not at question. But hey, don't take my word for it, there's plenty of papers on the topic: http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/0804/0804.1126.pdf

In order to force change you must make it unprofitable to continue as things were.

The U.S. oil and gas industry contributes 7.7% of U.S. GPD and 6% of U.S. labor income.

It is scary when people, or politicians for that matter, speak of "we are going to have to bankrupt them," because one realizes they don't understand what they are talking about.

Their contribution to the GDP has absolutely no relevance to this discussion whatsoever. If anything, it weakens the economic FUD put forward by JSawyer.

But again, it's not at all relevant. It's hardly a secret that established industries tend only to change what they're forced to, and right now it's far more profitable to fight AGAINST alternative energy and buy off politicians than it is to invest in those technologies. Thus the need to make it less profitable to maintain the status quo and more profitable to move things forward, as proven throughout history (ESPECIALLY recent history), and borne out in established economic theory.

Why would it cause the GDP to grow slower? If they actually do what they're being encouraged to, namely reduce emissions and work on cleaner tech (which may mean more jobs for researchers and inventors), would this not have a positive impact?

Please answer this:

Quote:

Can you show me of any other example, when governments taxed existing product, just to fund research for a better one?

Did government tax black&white TV sets, in order to fund development of color TV sets?Did government tax analogue TV sets, in order to fund development of digital TV sets?Did government tax corded phones, in order to fund development of mobile phones?Did government tax 45nm chips, in order to fund development of 32nm chips?

Why the sense of urgency that current tech is not up to standard? Why expend mounds of resources to expedite the normal progression of technology?

So you're saying that in competitive, evolving markets with a strong incentive to be first on the block with a new must-have product, are willing to invest in those improvements so that their competitors don't beat them out? Well no shit, that never would have occurred to me. Of course it's in no way applicable to THIS situation, since we're not talking about competitive or evolving markets, we're talking about regional monopolies with strong interest in the status quo, further influenced by mountains of money from the oil industries (maybe coal too, I haven't really followed their side of it, since everyone already accepts that coal should be avoided when possible).

As to examples of taxing something to provide disincentive and using that money to fund something else to mitigate that issue, take a look at alcohol and cigarettes. They're both taxed heavily (especially cigarettes), and the money is used to fund education and advertising against underage use, against smoking in general, against drinking and driving, etc.

It's also worth noting that yes, the phone system was and IS taxed, and that money is used to subsidize build-out to areas they wouldn't have otherwise. That is to say, they taxed the thing the incumbents wanted to do anyway (provide phone service to densely populated -- read: most profitable -- areas) and used the proceeds to pay for what they didn't want to do (extend service to sparsely populated areas).

As I pointed out before, it's a very well-established concept in economic theory, and it does work.

Let me point out that there is a scenario where part of the oil industry may be inclined to fund the kind of nuclear development that I am advocating- say to improve tar sands production, but I think it is imprudent to sit back and wait for that to happen.

Not anticipating and directing where the market should go in matters of energy is costing us all. Of course, this is a nontrivial issue: the Soviet Union once had a plan to power their economy with a low cost reactor which led them to choose the RBMK, and we know how that turned out. So there's a ton of fear around nuclear technology: radioactive waste, fissile which can be used for weapons, and machines which may have hidden problems.

I believe the Green Movement can be persuaded to change their position on nuclear energy by helping them realize the predicament we are in because of the difficulty of lowering the cost of clean energy while minimizing environmental impact. The Green political platform is founded upon a glaring contradiction, and by attacking it, a fracture could be leveraged that saves the movement while marginalizing those irrational fanatics that would push us to self-destruction.

I wonder how many economists still believe that the economy operates independently of energy, the majority of them? I am always running into people who appear to have little to no grasp of this fundamental relationship. Surplus energy is wealth.

Why would it cause the GDP to grow slower? If they actually do what they're being encouraged to, namely reduce emissions and work on cleaner tech (which may mean more jobs for researchers and inventors), would this not have a positive impact?

Please answer this:

Quote:

Can you show me of any other example, when governments taxed existing product, just to fund research for a better one?

Did government tax black&white TV sets, in order to fund development of color TV sets?Did government tax analogue TV sets, in order to fund development of digital TV sets?Did government tax corded phones, in order to fund development of mobile phones?Did government tax 45nm chips, in order to fund development of 32nm chips?

Why the sense of urgency that current tech is not up to standard? Why expend mounds of resources to expedite the normal progression of technology?

So you're saying that in competitive, evolving markets with a strong incentive to be first on the block with a new must-have product, are willing to invest in those improvements so that their competitors don't beat them out? Well no shit, that never would have occurred to me. Of course it's in no way applicable to THIS situation, since we're not talking about competitive or evolving markets, we're talking about regional monopolies with strong interest in the status quo, further influenced by mountains of money from the oil industries (maybe coal too, I haven't really followed their side of it, since everyone already accepts that coal should be avoided when possible).

As to examples of taxing something to provide disincentive and using that money to fund something else to mitigate that issue, take a look at alcohol and cigarettes. They're both taxed heavily (especially cigarettes), and the money is used to fund education and advertising against underage use, against smoking in general, against drinking and driving, etc.

It's also worth noting that yes, the phone system was and IS taxed, and that money is used to subsidize build-out to areas they wouldn't have otherwise. That is to say, they taxed the thing the incumbents wanted to do anyway (provide phone service to densely populated -- read: most profitable -- areas) and used the proceeds to pay for what they didn't want to do (extend service to sparsely populated areas).

As I pointed out before, it's a very well-established concept in economic theory, and it does work.

Let me point out that there is a scenario where part of the oil industry may be inclined to fund the kind of nuclear development that I am advocating- say to improve tar sands production, but I think it is imprudent to sit back and wait for that to happen.

Not anticipating and directing where the market should go in matters of energy is costing us all. Of course, this is a nontrivial issue: the Soviet Union once had a plan to power their economy with a low cost reactor which led them to choose the RBMK, and we know how that turned out. So there's a ton of fear around nuclear technology: radioactive waste, fissile which can be used for weapons, and machines which may have hidden problems.

I believe the Green Movement can be persuaded to change their position on nuclear energy by helping them realize the predicament we are in because of the difficulty of lowering the cost of clean energy while minimizing environmental impact. The Green political platform is founded upon a glaring contradiction, and by attacking it, a fracture could be leveraged that saves the movement while marginalizing those irrational fanatics that would push us to self-destruction.

I wonder how many economists still believe that the economy operates independently of energy, the majority of them? I am always running into people who appear to have little to no grasp of this fundamental relationship. Surplus energy is wealth.

Yeah, I don't much like the anti-nuclear camp myself (though see ZERO problems with having sane third parties run and heavily guard the plants in places like North Korea or Iran to help mitigate the weapon angle).

Modern breeder reactors are extremely efficient and (relatively speaking) clean. It's an excellent and potent option for supplying the world's energy needs while we're still working on improving the greener options like solar (which is only getting more efficient as time goes on; I seem to recall several significant breakthroughs just in the past year or so being mentioned here on Ars).

I feel it is the height of hubris to think we can successfully geoengineer our climate at this stage. We have such limited insight into how things could be affected. It's not like we can mess up and try again with another planet. I think it will be hundreds of years of research before we can truly look at this as a viable option. That being said I am all for the research to begin but to think it is going to be a near future fix to our problems is naive.

I feel it is the height of hubris to think we can successfully geoengineer our climate at this stage. We have such limited insight into how things could be affected. It's not like we can mess up and try again with another planet. I think it will be hundreds of years of research before we can truly look at this as a viable option. That being said I am all for the research to begin but to think it is going to be a near future fix to our problems is naive.

On the contrary, we understand this stuff fairly well (thus the certainty levels you see in the overwhelming majority of the research.) We pretty much know what introducing X quantity of Y will do. The better question is how well can we control what we're doing, the aforementioned X value. This is more of a political and coordination issue than a technical or scientific one, and those are issues that came up in the article and here in the comments. Those are the big hurdles to deal with, not what to do or how to do it to achieve the desired effects.

No, I am not. You are...or are just are a really poor reader and managed to first miss the link and then miss the sentence below my link. Bringing us to:

Quote:

Your Thursday, April 1, 2010 Washington Post reference is obsolete given the actual 5-year no-development order I cited, and which is dated November 8, 2011, one-and-a-half years later.

How am I disingenuous when I pointed out the temporal relationship myself? That you failed to quote my sentence doesn't mean it does not exist. Also, it is not obsolete in regards to Hastings claimed "Since President Obama took office, he has systematically taken steps to re-impose an offshore drilling moratorium...".

Tyler, you can try and obfuscate from now till the cows come home.The point remains: there is a 5-year moratorium on federal oil regions at this time, and the new us oil and gas independence is coming from private lands which government hasn't yet been able to obstruct.

Now onto the next part you missed/disingenuously ignored: The nature of offshore development is such that lease procurement till production timelines run around a decade. This does not shorten when dealing with an entirely new region.

So in truth the your original bringing in of that moratorium is irrelevant to the discussion of current private/public mix.

Tyler, time flies and yesterday's moratorium becomes today's dependence on foreign oil. True, the bizarre sealing of most sea floors to development probably hasn't impacted your fuel tank as of April 2013, but you will come to rue the day in a few short years.

Point is, you obfuscate the deleterious effect of today's policies by narrowly focusing on a very short time window, and arguing as if such decisions had no impact over a longer time period.

Misallocation of resources creates a drag on creating value, lower GDP is only a result of it.

Over and out,JSawyer

So your problem is not with the carbon tax, but the specific application of the proceeds in this particular instance. <s>Clearly that invalidates the entire concept itself. By this reasoning I can take the perfect sports play to counter the enemy's strategy, and simply by choosing the wrong players for each position, that in itself invalidates the strategy itself.</s>

As previously pointed out, a carbon-tax can and would be very effective, as shown through numerous examples and justifying why it's so well-established in economic theory. If the money is mismanaged you're right, it wouldn't help as much as managing the money well would (though it WOULD still help, as it STILL provides incentive to reduce emissions).

We seem to have gotten to the heart of it, and I think you for admitting that the problem isn't a carbon tax, but mismanagement of the money from it. So instead of continuing the FUD, how about being constructive? How would YOU allocate the revenue from the carbon tax so as to assist the building and improvement of alternative energy sources?

No, I am not. You are...or are just are a really poor reader and managed to first miss the link and then miss the sentence below my link. Bringing us to:

Quote:

Your Thursday, April 1, 2010 Washington Post reference is obsolete given the actual 5-year no-development order I cited, and which is dated November 8, 2011, one-and-a-half years later.

How am I disingenuous when I pointed out the temporal relationship myself? That you failed to quote my sentence doesn't mean it does not exist. Also, it is not obsolete in regards to Hastings claimed "Since President Obama took office, he has systematically taken steps to re-impose an offshore drilling moratorium...".

Misallocation of resources creates a drag on creating value, lower GDP is only a result of it.

Over and out,JSawyer

So your problem is not with the carbon tax, but the specific application of the proceeds in this particular instance. <s>Clearly that invalidates the entire concept itself. By this reasoning I can take the perfect sports play to counter the enemy's strategy, and simply by choosing the wrong players for each position, that in itself invalidates the strategy itself.</s>

As previously pointed out, a carbon-tax can and would be very effective, as shown through numerous examples and justifying why it's so well-established in economic theory. If the money is mismanaged you're right, it wouldn't help as much as managing the money well would (though it WOULD still help, as it STILL provides incentive to reduce emissions).

We seem to have gotten to the heart of it, and I think you for admitting that the problem isn't a carbon tax, but mismanagement of the money from it. So instead of continuing the FUD, how about being constructive? How would YOU allocate the revenue from the carbon tax so as to assist the building and improvement of alternative energy sources?

I said I'm going to stay out of the debate, but you are reading my words totally wrong. See the Wiki article I linked:

Quote:

Causes of deadweight loss can include monopoly pricing (in the case of artificial scarcity), externalities, taxes or subsidies, and binding price ceilings or floors (including minimum wages). The term deadweight loss may also be referred to as the "excess burden" of monopoly or taxation.

You are always going to take net taxes from the productive (profitable) entities, while the government decides the criteria for subsidies. Even without any corruption, there's misallocation of resources. I've worked on preparing project documentation to get EU funds - the projects had to be artificially structured in such a way to get most points - even if it otherwise didn't have any sense economically. Here's your deadweight loss. Corruption on top of that is just a bonus. Taking money from winners (taxes) and giving it to the losers (subsidies) is not a recipe for success.* Just remember, if taxes were really so good as you picture them here, we could tax our way to prosperity.

* I'm talking about companies here. I do support social transfers for the bottom quintile.

Misallocation of resources creates a drag on creating value, lower GDP is only a result of it.

Over and out,JSawyer

So your problem is not with the carbon tax, but the specific application of the proceeds in this particular instance. <s>Clearly that invalidates the entire concept itself. By this reasoning I can take the perfect sports play to counter the enemy's strategy, and simply by choosing the wrong players for each position, that in itself invalidates the strategy itself.</s>

As previously pointed out, a carbon-tax can and would be very effective, as shown through numerous examples and justifying why it's so well-established in economic theory. If the money is mismanaged you're right, it wouldn't help as much as managing the money well would (though it WOULD still help, as it STILL provides incentive to reduce emissions).

We seem to have gotten to the heart of it, and I think you for admitting that the problem isn't a carbon tax, but mismanagement of the money from it. So instead of continuing the FUD, how about being constructive? How would YOU allocate the revenue from the carbon tax so as to assist the building and improvement of alternative energy sources?

I said I'm going to stay out of the debate, but you are reading my words totally wrong. See the Wiki article I linked:

Quote:

Causes of deadweight loss can include monopoly pricing (in the case of artificial scarcity), externalities, taxes or subsidies, and binding price ceilings or floors (including minimum wages). The term deadweight loss may also be referred to as the "excess burden" of monopoly or taxation.

You are always going to take net taxes from the productive (profitable) entities, while the government decides the criteria for subsidies. Even without any corruption, there's misallocation of resources. I've worked on preparing project documentation to get EU funds - the projects had to be artificially structured in such a way to get most points - even if it otherwise didn't have any sense economically. Here's your deadweight loss. Corruption on top of that is just a bonus. Taking money from winners (taxes) and giving it to the losers (subsidies) is not a recipe for success.* Just remember, if taxes were really so good as you picture them here, we could tax our way to prosperity.

* I'm talking about companies here. I do support social transfers for the bottom quintile.

So let me get this straight, that taxation CAN be a cause of a deadweight loss, that is your supporting evidence for your assertion that taxation IS a deadweight loss, period? Like I said, learn the concepts involved here, because you're clearly not getting them (unsurprising, as you don't seem to want to.)

You then go on to complain about sub-100% efficiency. Is there overhead loss by taxing and then subsidizing? Yes. Is this a problem? Not really. The point was never the money, the point was adjusting BEHAVIOR with money as the TOOL. Undesirable behavior becomes more costly via taxation, desirable behavior becomes less costly via subsidy. Even with losses to overhead, this is will achieve the desired goal.

So far you've done nothing to refute that fact. You keep going with your FUD about how it's just wasting money, how it won't do anything, and how somehow a POSSIBLE temporary economic issue (that might actually be MITIGATED by such a plan) is a greater threat than NOT stopping behavior that if not stopped soon WILL result in one of if not the single most-extreme extinction event in the history of our planet.

You keep going back to mismanagement and other straw men as if they refute the core concept and theory. It's a red herring.

So let me get this straight, that taxation CAN be a cause of a deadweight loss, that is your supporting evidence for your assertion that taxation IS a deadweight loss, period? Like I said, learn the concepts involved here, because you're clearly not getting them (unsurprising, as you don't seem to want to.)

I have MA in Economics, I'm pretty sure I know the basic concepts. Taxation to uphold rule of law and enable commerce has positive impact. Taxation for pet projects and a bogeyman of imminent doom and gloom create nothing but evidently suboptimal results. In this economic climate (pun intended), we cannot afford such policies.

Not really. The point was never the money, the point was adjusting BEHAVIOR with money as the TOOL. Undesirable behavior becomes more costly via taxation, desirable behavior becomes less costly via subsidy. Even with losses to overhead, this is will achieve the desired goal.

Yes avant-garde of the proletariat knows best what is best for the proletariat. People who earn money are too stupid to know what to do with it, so we need elite to spend OUR money for us in a better, more "desirable" way. Been there, done that, it wasn't fun.

So let me get this straight, that taxation CAN be a cause of a deadweight loss, that is your supporting evidence for your assertion that taxation IS a deadweight loss, period? Like I said, learn the concepts involved here, because you're clearly not getting them (unsurprising, as you don't seem to want to.)

I have MA in Economics, I'm pretty sure I know the basic concepts. Taxation to uphold rule of law and enable commerce has positive impact. Taxation for pet projects and a bogeyman of imminent doom and gloom...

What if it's not A) a boogey man and B) not "doom and gloom" but instead actual economic harm? That's what economists are finding about climate change; the benefits of carbon pricing outweigh the costs of the system, compared with letting things proceed as normal with distorted fossil fuel prices that don't account for externalities like wrecking the environment or human health.

Quote:

In this economic climate (pun intended), we cannot afford such policies.

Why should we all fund the fulfillment of the desire of some to cling to the old climate?

Are you being facetious? Certainly if you understand what is happening (we are increasing the thickness of the insulating CO2 blanket with our emissions which swamps the natural cycle by about 80 times) and the consequences (more energy must be dissipated by the climate system) we are looking at more violent storms, more erosion, the flooding of low lying areas which will affect hundreds of millions of people- mass migrations, the loss of biological diversity, and a tremendous cost to civilization that will threaten political stability. We would be wise to avoid this mess by decoupling our economic activity from emissions, but of course attempting that with low density energy sources like renewables is a fool's errand. That leaves nuclear energy, but even conventional technology is entirely inadequate for our needs. At least we know where to focus our R&D....

What questions? You made several assertions, such as the one quoted below, there were no questions...

Quote:

...account for externalities like wrecking the environment or human health.

There is an immediate harm to the environment and human health from dirty technologies such as batteries (for electric cars and solar technologies) and compact fluorescent lamps. I don't want pollutants to get into the subterranean water. Furthermore, mining lithium is very dirty. Hypothesized bad consequences from climate change are exchanged for immediate hazard to environment human health. As Borat would say, Great suck-cess.

Lowering CO2 emissions is the most expensive way to fight climate change. It's much more cost efficient to mitigate supposed adverse effects of warming. If Siberia becomes the new breadbasket, why would we be worse off?

As for, "can we afford that". It's a matter of your spending priorities. I would want payments from people that cling to the old climate, since warmer climate would be beneficial for me. With higher levels of CO2 plants flourish. Those people want to force me to forgo the benefits of the new climate, and I want to be paid damages.

The current state of public fisc is such that most governments need to take austerity measures. In addition to that, they often raise tax rates. In US it's sequestration, elsewhere it's no better.

Lowering CO2 emissions is the most expensive way to fight climate change. It's much more cost efficient to mitigate supposed adverse effects of warming. If Siberia becomes the new breadbasket, why would we be worse off?

As for, "can we afford that". It's a matter of your spending priorities. I would want payments from people that cling to the old climate, since warmer climate would be beneficial for me. With higher levels of CO2 plants flourish. Those people want to force me to forgo the benefits of the new climate, and I want to be paid damages.

The current state of public fisc is such that most governments need to take austerity measures. In addition to that, they often raise tax rates. In US it's sequestration, elsewhere it's no better.

A transition to a nuclear economy will have a great many benefits, including the creation of far more wealth than is possible with fossil fuels. It will make responding to "locked-in" warming (thermal inertia within the climate system) much easier. It is clearly cheaper to spend billions today in R&D on the right technology to minimize the risks.

I'm all for nukes, but a lot of environmentalists aren't. But nuclear power plants can compete on their own, without taxes & corresponding subsidies that distort the market. There is enough incentive for reactor providers (Westinghouse and Co.) to invest in R&D as a private company.

Government should fund only basic research (where there is no commercial interest to do so), carbon taxes / caps are far away from doing that.

I'm all for nukes, but a lot of environmentalists aren't. But nuclear power plants can compete on their own, without taxes & corresponding subsidies that distort the market. There is enough incentive for reactor providers (Westinghouse and Co.) to invest in R&D as a private company.

Government should fund only basic research (where there is no commercial interest to do so), carbon taxes / caps are far away from doing that.

It is probably true that the IMSR that I am referring to will probably eventually make it to market without any intervention, but it is extremely foolish of us to not actively usher in this technology by revising our regulatory regime and supporting the technological development with public funds. It is in effect ignoring our present predicament. Why would we not do everything we can to develop this critical industry that is necessary for our survival? The industry has ignored this type of technology for decades- so much for the free market.

And as for the environmental movement, it is a collection of contradictory values that will break on nuclear when pressed with the appropriate technology. This is by far the most environmentally sane approach to power production available due to efficiency and energy density- the public merely remains largely ignorant of the technology, the potential, and the need.

Once the reactor moves out of development, private industry can devote the resources required to bring the machine to market across every continent.

Because it's not likely that other, established breadbaskets will still be around if that does happen. What is more likely is that the US breadbasket will falter, and Canada can't pick up the slack because much of its northern soil was scraped away during the last glaciation. Meanwhile a warmer Siberia will release far more methane (an extremely powerful GHG that eventually decomposes into long-lived CO2) through thawing permafrost, exacerbating the problem.

Quote:

As for, "can we afford that". It's a matter of your spending priorities. I would want payments from people that cling to the old climate, since warmer climate would be beneficial for me.